UFC 208 prelims do 874,000 viewers

If the prelim television ratings are any indication, UFC 208 doesn’t look to have been a strong performer when it comes to mainstream interest.

The prelims on FOX Sports 1 prior to the card headlined by Germaine de Randamie vs. Holly Holm for the newly-created women’s featherweight title, plus Anderson Silva in the cofeature, did 874,000 viewers. Based on last year’s numbers, that would be in the middle of the pack.

Out of last year’s 12 pay-per-view prelims on FS 1, six would have done better and six would have done worse even though it would be 25 percent below the 2016 average of 1,168,00 viewers. The average itself is heavily swayed by the big numbers drawn by the prelims before UFC 196, 200, 202, 205 and 207.

The show peaked at 1,046,000 viewers for the Belal Muhammad decision win over Randy Brown.

The ratings aren’t a perfect predictor of how the pay-per-view will do, but more often than not, they are a good indicator. The five biggest pay-per-view prelims of last year were the five shows that topped 1 million viewers.

Holm’s prior fight, with Valentina Shevchenko, which she lost via decision, was the biggest UFC on FOX audience for a summer show. But there’s no indication Saturday’s show drove a similar level of success on pay-per-view.

The pre-fight show did 259,000 viewers, and the post-fight show did 207,000 viewers. The most recent pay-per-view show that wasn’t one of the big ones, UFC 206 on Dec. 10 in Toronto, headlined by Max Holloway vs. Anthony Pettis for the interim featherweight title, which is believed to have done UFC’s lowest pay-per-view numbers of 2016. It did 771,000 for the prelims, 233,000 for the pre-fight show and 97,000 viewers for the post-fight show.